Minding Your Business-Are You Ignoring Your Customers' Requests?

Presented on US Sports Net by Yahoo Small Business!

By: Willie Crawford

Many Internet marketing experts will tell you that the best way to find out what your customers want from you is to ask them. While that may be true, I believe that an even more accurate way is to just listen to what they're telling you, and to what they're asking you for. To illustrate my point, I'll use a couple of examples from one of my own niches... the recipe and cookbook niche. If you already have even a minor foothold in any niche, my experience should be somewhat instructive. In-case you're unfamiliar with my background, I earn six-figures from a soul food cookbook that I wrote and self-published. I wrote that cookbook because my site visitors asked for it. Get 25% off websites at Yahoo Small Business with code WEBSITE25 The full story behind my first cookbook is that, when I first came online in 1996, I was told that I should focus on a niche. After building your typical "Internet marketing" site, which didn't really take off immediately, I eventually decided to build a site around the "soul food" recipes that I learned while growing up on a farm in North Carolina. I posted a few of my favorite recipes online as search engine bait, and then advertised affiliate products around the site ... usually with banners. I was also told that I needed a mailing list to bring visitors back to the site, and to stay in touch with potential customers. With a recipe site, it made perfect sense to me to create a list where people could trade recipes. That list was an immediate hit, and has been going strong for over 8 years. While the recipes sent out through the list were primarily from site visitors, list members grew to associate me with great recipes. They eventually started asking me if I had a cookbook. I told them "no" but that I would write one if they would buy it. I also announced that I was taking advance orders (to verify the demand). I had over 100 orders before I wrote the first word. That cookbook has provided me, and my family, with a comfortable living for YEARS! Over the years, I tried to sell those site visitors, and list members, a variety of different backend products, but nothing sold as well as my cookbook. For the last six years,list members have regularly told me what my next few products should be, but I wasn't really listening. List members regularly emailed me saying that they loved my recipes, but that they were on restricted diets. They often asked if I had diabetic, low-fat or low-carb recipes. They also often wrote to tell me that they'd been diagnosed with high blood pressure, and asked if I had any recipes for people with hypertension. When I finally started listening, I knew exactly what my next 4-5 products should be. They should be versions of my cookbook featuring diabetic, low-fat and low-carb recipes. I also needed to write a cookbook for those with high blood pressure. All of those cookbooks will be rolled out to my list and sites within the next 2 months! What's also instructive is that over the years I built up this HUGE asset... people who have bought cookbooks from me and then asked if I had more. They were telling me what to sell them. They were telling me that if I just offered them what they WANTED they would buy it. The above is just applying basic common sense and a little bit of marketing know-how ...which most Internet marketers already possess. Let me share with you a few more insights that you probably already have but are not using. 1) The easiest way in the world to make more money from a proven, profitable niche is to "go deep." Produce multiple episodes or versions of the product. That's what movie producers do. That's what traditional book publishers do. Look at the "Chicken Soup For The Soul" series! That told me that if I produced additional versions of my cookbook, it would sell. My list members also "told" me that. The way that I will apply this is by re-labeling my first cookbook "Volume 1" during the next printing. Then, I will introduce "Volume 2" and as many volumes as the market will bear over the years. Labeling the original "Volume 1" tells my customers to look for additional volumes. It sets up collectors to collect the complete series. Speaking of collectors, another version of your product that you can release is a limited collectors' edition... if appropriate for your marketplace. The co-producer and host of the television cooking show that I'll tell you about later is doing just that. At my prompting, he's released a "Limited Edition Autographed Version" of his cookbook, "The Devotional Cookbook." You can see how he did that with my help at: http://Chitterlings.com/devotionalcookbook.html What will make the limited editon of the cookbook, in the example above, sell out really fast is the fact that it really is only being released in a very limited quantity, and that a television personality is autographing copies. Ask yourself how you can apply a similar idea to your product. I'll admit that this idea isn't something that I dreamed up... it's somethings that I heard a speaker use as an example at a seminar. All I did was have my client APPLY the idea! 2) Go deep by offering more versions of your basic product. For example, with my cookbook, I offer it in PDF, print, and on CD. In a few months many of my recipes will be available on DVD since I will share them on a television cooking show that I'll be co-producing. My mentors long ago told me that I needed not only a cooking show, but a full line of spices and sauces. Instead of listening to them, I went off in search of more exotic markets... largely ignoring the hungry market that I already had (pun intended). It took one of my clients, coming to me with an idea for a cooking show that he had, to get me into the television business. When you really think about it though, producing a cooking show is just repackaging the information that I already have into a different format. Listening to my market, will not only allow me to triple my book sales, it will also generate millions when the show is nationally syndicated. The show is just beginning production now, but will grow rapidly. You can follow our progress, and learn from the process, by frequenting our blog at: http://TheDevotionalChef.com/blog You can also see how I develop and market a full line of cookbooks and related products by visiting my cooking site at: http://Chitterlings.com Go ahead and join the mailing list, as this is where I announce new products and site news. A few people may ask why I share so much of what I'm doing in my cooking niche with you here. You may wonder if I'm not afraid of competition. The fact is that there are MILLIONS of webpages out there offering free recipes, yet I earn six-figures selling them. The fact is that there are thousands of people who have written cookbooks and are having difficulty selling them. I don't have to worry about competition because by studying Internet marketing I have learned how to dominate my niche. What should you do with the information that I've just shared with you? Ask yourself how you can apply it in your niche. Ask yourself if your site visitors and subscribers aren't already telling you what they want to buy! Once you discover that your product is a hit with the marketplace, listen to them as they tell you how to improve the product, and how to sell more things to them. Instead of going off looking for new and more glamorous markets, serve the one that you've already mastered. Apply the many marketing techniques you already know to your existing niche. It will pay off handsomely! Willie Crawford has been teaching Internet marketing for over 9 years.

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Minding Your Business-How To Create and Run a Deals and Offers Website

Presented on US Sports Net By Yahoo Small Business!

By: Dana Collins

Nowadays, business merchants believe that product sales increase once they sell their products through group deals online - several merchants have reported that their online sales have shot up by over 50% as a result of these deals. Internet marketers and e-commerce site owners have started thinking about different ways of increasing their online sales. When a users is available in searching for a product, they look for a website that offers them the cheapest price or at discounted rates without compromising on quality. A lot of different techniques are for sale to increasing your online sales. But one surefire method of increasing your sales is creating large amount of deals, offering products for discount prices, etc and spreading them over the internet. Here are the processes to generate deals, offers, etc. and promote exactly the same online. WHAT YOUR NICHE IS Rivaling businesses that target a different segment or user base can often backfire. As a marketer, it is important to understand your target audience and the segment your product falls under. Understanding your niche plays the major role in competing online. A successful internet marketer should have understood his/her niche much better than anyone else in the business. HOT PRODUCTS Offering flat discounts on all products will only erode your margins this will get you a net negative effect on your bottom line in the long term. Pick a few items that you feel are hot or will gain more user interest on the web. Do some research on what goods are being searched more regularly online and identify the best set of products you sell for which you can offer discounts or any other deals. PICK COMPETITORS Website Builder - Easily create a beautiful, mobile friendly website for as little as $7/mo! One basic tenet in Internet Marketing is to take a look at competitors as much as you possibly can. Do not just blindly pick 15 or 20 competitors and do what they're doing as it can backfire. Instead, understand the position of the website presence online and identify that are other websites are competing against you. Attempt to analyze the sales techniques they use for their online sales like the prices they offer and promotional techniques they follow to increase their online sales. BEAUTIFUL OFFERS It's not possible to provide 50% off on all products or sell your products for free. Identify the very best price that you can offer your product or service and at the same time ensure that your pricing is competitive when compared with your competitors. Make buyers believe that they gain something which your competitors aren't giving. Generate deals, coupons and other methods in which a user can avail their discounts about the products you are promoting. Make people wait for the next of deals you are offering in future. MARKET YOUR OFFERS After you generate a summary of offers for that hot products, you have to promote those offers online that give you maximum visibility. There are numerous deals and coupon websites are available in the internet. Identify the best deal and coupon sites and add your offers there to increase your online visibility. Some of the best websites are OfferTopper.com, SnapDeal, DailyDeal, Koovs, etc. There are lot of different internet marketing techniques available in order to increase your online sales. I've discussed one of the techniques that we believe will bring in more sales. You can check how to run a Deals and Offers website over here at Shop and Bargain. The most important thing about a deals and offers website is the trust that it builds on the visitors, if you are looking for quick buck then you cannot succeed over the long run. So build trust and never hard sell to your customers. If it is possible then offer them comparison charts between brands and products.

The author runs several websites dealing in offers and discounts. You can Check one of his Deals and coupons website

Minding Your Business-Using Business Credit Cards for Business Expenses

Presented on US Sports Net By Yahoo Small Business!

By: Pamela Williams

Regardless of the type of business you own or how long you have been in operations, getting a real credit card for business is a must. True, you cannot finance an entire business using only business credit cards, but they can be wonderful back-up to cover for monthly expenses or unexpected needs, particularly when cash flow is tight. Today, let’s discuss how entrepreneurs can use business credit cards to their benefit. Using Credit Cards for Business Expenses Some entrepreneurs may insist that there is no need to apply for a business credit card since they can also use their personal credit cards to pay for business expenses. Indeed, you can use your personal credit card for any purpose you want, but business owners are completely discouraged from mixing personal and business finances. As your company grows and expenses increase, it will be very difficult to make financial decisions if your personal and business accounts are merged. On the contrary, having a separate business account can help the business owner keep track of his/her company’s budget and avoid unnecessary spending. In fact, a business credit card holder can use credit card statements and annual account summary reports as accurate references when performing accounting tasks or when filing business taxes. Yahoo Small Business Web Hosting - Build a great web site with our easy-to-use tools  Business credit cards are also the best tools in building corporate credit history. As you use your business credit card to pay for your company’s expenses and pay off balances on time, you are building up your Paydex Score at the same time. Just be sure to choose a credit card company that offers credit reporting to the business credit bureau such as Dun and Bradstreet and Experian Business. Hence, in case you may need to apply for a business loan, getting approved can be much less complicated. And since it’s easier to apply for a business credit card than a business loan, new entrepreneurs can establish credit history using a business credit card to increase chances of getting a loan approval. After a year or two of consistent payments, you will surely be able to present an impressive business credit history to potential lenders. Employees and Supplementary Cards Supplementary credit cards are credit cards that are linked to the primary business credit cardholder’s account. These cards can distributed to selected employees so they can simply charge small business expenses without having to go through the long process of requesting for cash and waiting for the funds to be released. All purchases made using the supplementary or employee credit card will be reflected to the business credit card owner’s account. This way, employee spending can be closely monitored and unofficial transactions can be avoided. Smart Management of Your Business Credit Card Account As a personal credit cardholder, you may probably well know that timely payment is crucial. In the same way, business credit card balances should be paid on time as well. Keep in mind that in order to build and maintain a good business credit history, you need to make sure that all your accounts are free from late payments or negative remarks.

Pamela Williams is a Loan Consultant, Internet Marketer, Writer and owner of BusinessCreditCardSite.com, a finance company in Las Vegas, Nevada that provides support for businesses all across the US particularly with obtaining credit cards for business.

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Minding Your Business-Keys to Be Successful in Business Marketing

Presented on US Sports Net By Yahoo Small Business!

By: Jerzy Banas

Business marketing is when a business markets and sells its goods and services to other businesses or organizations. These other organizations may resell these goods and services or use them in their own business to support their operations. Business marketing is often called as industrial marketing or business-to-business (B2B) marketing. The perfect example of Business to business marketing is the automobile industry. Automobile companies buy various spare parts such as tires, batteries, electronics and door locks which are manufactured independently by other businesses and sold directly to automobile manufacturers to assemble automobiles. Business Mail - Get 1000 GB of Free Space w/ Yahoo Business Mail!  Even the Service industry is also engaged in large number of business to business transactions. For example Companies specializing in housekeeping provide services exclusively to other organizations, rather than individual consumers. Business-to-customer marketing is when a business markets and sells its goods and services to retail consumers for personal use. While most companies that sell directly to consumers can be referred to as B2C companies. The business-to-consumer as a business model differs significantly from the business-to-business model, which refers to transaction between two or more businesses. Business market (B2B) vs. Consumer marketing (B2C) B2C marketing differs from B2B marketing in a number of key ways. A Business market has very few customers as compared to a consumer market which has large numbers of customers. A business market usually sells a customized product where as a consumer market sells a homogenous product. A Business to business transaction is a huge value transaction as purchase quantity is very high where as business to consumer transaction is a small value transaction. Price can be negotiated in business markets where as price is usually fixed in consumer market. Business markets have lengthy and complex selling process with multiple decision makers but in consumer market buying decision are simple and are made by individuals. Keys to success in Business markets are: 1) Value creation and; Customer satisfaction Business begins with value creation. It is the prime objective of the business to create and deliver value in an efficient manner which will ultimately lead to profits. Value leads to customer satisfaction. Customer experience is an integral part of B2B marketing. The customer experience is the key brand differentiator, even more than the price and product. 2) Social media marketing Social media marketing is when a company uses social media platforms such as Facebook or Twitter to market its product or services. Social media marketing is one of the best and efficient platforms for marketers. Most social media platforms have built-in data analytics tools which enable companies to track the progress, success, and engagement of ad campaigns. Companies address a range of stakeholders through social media marketing including current and potential customers. 3) Mobile marketing Mobile marketing is a digital marketing strategy whose aim is reaching a target audience on their Smartphone, tablets, and other mobile devices through email, SMS and multimedia messages. Smartphone usage has increased multiple times during the last few years, app usage has also highly increased. Therefore, mobile marketers have increasingly taken advantage of Smartphone apps as a marketing resource. Marketers aim to optimize the visibility of an app in a store, which will maximize the number of downloads. This practice is called App Store Optimization (ASO). 4) Multimedia Content Marketing Marketing using Multimedia content attracts more customers. B2B marketers are widely adopting this trend. The primary driver is the desire to make content more engaging, compelling, and shareable than just the traditional modes. The most common forms of visual content include 360-degree videos. 5) Effective Personal selling & Executive Branding Distribution channel is the path through which the product reaches the final customer. Personal selling is the most preferred form of distribution and promotion used by B2B marketers The sellers promote the product through their attitude, appearance and specialist product knowledge. Executive Branding is when an executive showcases his professional strengths as a way to attract the customers. Executive branding is also known as reputation management. Especially in B2B environments, executive branding is now considered a necessity. Senior management must create and develop their personal brand image to attract new customers.

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Minding Your Business-Are You Being A Resourceful Manager and Entrepreneur?

Presented on US Sports Net by Yahoo Small Business!

By: Samuel Seeto

Information is much easier to gain access to nowadays because of the continual advances in technology that are going on day after day. The expansion and swiftness of the Internet is a central example of how technology has revolutionized over time. The Internet is proving to be the most suitable and resourceful place to find information and expand your business. So why do so many people still fall short to achieve results? Anthony Robbins is one individual who provides a ton of valuable knowledge (hence the reason he is very successful). He says that the reason why so many people fail is because of the excuses they create. He calls them limited resources. These limited resources (excuses) owned by the majority of people consist of: · Not enough money · Not enough time · Lack of personnel · Not the right technology · Not knowing how to plan or inadequate planning · Lack of quality leadership The mass majority of business owners blame their failures on a lack of resources. But let's look at some of the most successful entrepreneurs and leaders: · Bill Gates: Bought MS-DOS for $50k and sold it to IBM for over $50m · Richard Branson: Billionaire entrepreneur. Started a student magazine and selling music he liked in his garage - creator of Virgin) · Steve Jobs: Co-founder of Apple · Oprah Winfrey: Unfavourable circumstances during early childhood - Now a role model and inspiration to countless people especially African Americans simultaneously hosting her own talk show) · Lance Armstrong: Won the Tour de France 7 years in a row after beating testicular cancer · Mark Zuckerberg: Co-founder of Facebook. Originally designed as a network so only college students could interact, share photos and videos. Now it is a worldwide phenomenon They used their characteristics, positive attitudes, past experiences, took action and have now created much more resources. There is an abundance in available resources waiting for us all to make use of. Successful entrepreneurs and leaders do not believe in limited resources. Get accurate business listings across top directories with Localworks from Yahoo  It is no one else's fault if you are letting your emotions, your mindset, and your stance prevent you from taking action. It's your responsibility to be successful. Your life has an incredible calling. It's time for you to wake up and capture the opportunity. Rather than worrying or complaining about information overload, how about think about how lucky you are to have all this information and knowledge right in front of you? The majority of people in the planet have no chance of achieving what you can because they have no Internet access! Being an entrepreneur is the VEHICLE for which you create financial freedom and to "drive" anywhere you please to do anything you want. You either face the challenges or run away back to the drone known as the rat race. You are the leader you've been looking for.

Minding Your Business-Online Classified Ads - The Benefits

Presented on US Sports Net by Yahoo Small Business!

By: Patrick Lau

The days of spending hours flipping pages of telephone directories and business card folders are now the thing of the past. Ever since the creation of the internet, marketers are now turning to this method to advertise their products and services. People nowadays are looking for quick and safe means of accessing accurate and up-to-date information to keep pace with a constantly evolving society. Almost everyone are now turning to the internet for assistance in their quest for knowledge. Internet is not only the best means of accessing up-to-date information, it is also a place which allow people around the globe to interact with each other in a safe and exciting environment, thus bringing people all over the globe together. Register Your Domain for $9.95 with Yahoo Classified Ads, one of the most over-looked form of advertising, is an effective means of expressing ideas and exchanging information. It offer users the opportunity to post their ads on a webpage or to access the ads posted by others thus displaying all the information on the webpages in a fraction of a second. Classified Ads websites provide vast information, accurate and well-structured in various categories:auto classified, real estate classified, pet classified, service classified, job classified, event classified and many more which are easy to access. You can find various sites which provide posting of classified ads on the net. Some are free and some do charge a nominal fee for posting your ad. Some provide additional features to your posted ads and some also provide a storefront to enable you to categorize your products or services on the site. Most sites provide a easy to list method of posting your product or service. Most of the time, you will be entitle to submit a title of your ad, a description, photo which the number of photos allow varies from each site and hyperlinks. Once your ad is up on the classified ads site, the visibility of the ad will depend on the traffic or number of visitors on the site. These online service provider target consumers who has interest to gain more knowledge and to purchase a particular product or service over the internet. Classified Ads act as the easiest and simplest option to promote and publicize almost any product or service globally be it from amateurs or professional. Even important events or announcement held at any location can be promoted as well as propagate awareness via classified ads. This simple and effective procedure to gain publicity helps individual and companies to market their product at a much larger base. Whether you wish to find new happenings in your local area or to promote your business or service or product, to inform other people about the latest events, classified ads website are the best means to do it. Irregardless of you buying, selling, renting or exchanging, classified ads are perfect for you. If you are interested in buying a car, a home audio system, powerboat, a pet, looking for a house cleaner or even a business associates, classified ads website offer you the opportunity to choose among hundreds, maybe thousand of posting! Or you wish to sell your house, offer carpool, dispose off your unwanted stock or provide professional services, classified ads website can provide good exposure to your announcement. Classified ads website are a valuable source of information. It not only help in promoting your product or service and update the clients but will also generate sales for you. So why wait! Start looking for a reliable and professional classified ad website and you are on your way to achieve greater height for your goal!

Minding Your Business-Actualizing Your Wise Business Mind

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By: Pam Britton

In order to actualize anything we need to be fully present. In business, especially, we must remove all blinders. We must pay attention to all thoughts we have about the potential opportunity in front of us, not just the positives. MONEY MAKING POTENTIAL IS GOOD BUT NOT AT THE EXPENSE OF USING YOUR RATIONAL MIND! Too many times we get so driven by the "money-making potential" that we set aside our rational minds, sweeping under the rug anything that doesn't feel quite right. If you want to not get burned you must stay grounded and centered and trust your inner wise mind. Website Builder - Easily create a beautiful, mobile friendly website for as little as $7/mo! I now have under my business-belt of knowledge, some first-hand experience with a relatively new opportunity (which shall stay un-named) and wanted to share my process with you-- GREED IS THE CULPRIT--IT IS HUMAN, WE ALL POSSESS IT SO WATCH OUT FOR IT!! To put it bluntly, what got me burned this time was greed. That's right-- pure, unadulterated greed! It is not something I am proud of but it is a human quality we all have.* Smart entrepreneurs need be aware of their own greed when considering investing time and money into any new business. *Greed is a spirit that you have the choice to adopt or not. We do not have greed until we make the decision to be greedy The wise business person activates and turns the volume way up on the discriminating mind's antennae. With so many online opportunities it is easy to get mislead or scammed. I'm not saying we should look for the scam potential in every opportunity we meet. I'm just saying we need to turn on our intuitive powers after we've completed the other fact-finding due diligence efforts. PAY ATTENTION TO THE PIECES OF THE PUZZLE THAT JUST DON'T FIT Once we've filtered out those parts that do not seem quite right we should look at those areas which do not fit with the rest of the picture. It is in those puzzle pieces that don't quite "fit in" that we may find the key to choosing or NOT choosing a legitimate, potentially profitable business opportunity. In my case, I have always given greatest weight to the opinions of business partners who I trust, who have steered me down paths that have been quite profitable. However, even those we trust and who we know are not scam artists are capable of walking down the wrong path by their own greed factors. This is what I believe happened to me with my recent business loss. EVEN TRUSTED BUSINESS PARTNERS ARE CAPABLE OF THE GREED FACTOR--THEY'RE ONLY HUMAN, JUST LIKE YOU! My trusted business partner said to me as he referred me to this particular opportunity, that it had taken him a considerable amount of time to make up his mind before he decided to get started. He said what changed his mind was that others who had begun placing their advertising dollars into the opportunity were already in profit mode. He said they were doing well financially and had first-hand knowledge of these people. He went on to say that he trusted these entrepreneurs and knew their characters, so decided to give it a go. However, he did agree with me that the opportunity sounded "too good to be true"--both of us used to tell one another that "if it sounds too good to be true then it probably is!" What is noteworthy here is that I completely ignored my internal voice that was telling me not to take part in this business model as it definitely sounded too good to be true. My rational mind knew that it was too good to be true, yet I forged ahead anyway. I began engaging in "wishful thinking" that just this one time it was not too good to be true. In other words, I deluded myself. I placed a false protective shield around my efforts based not on reality, but on hope for a pie-in-the sky positive outcome, just in this one case--my case! Not very wise, indeed! HOW TO ACTUALIZE YOUR WISE BUSINESS MIND-- 1. The wise mind values the internal voice which intuits potential danger ahead. 2. The wise business mind does not act on "too good to be true" sounding business opportunities. 3. In short, to actualize your wise business mind pay close attention to your gut feeling and do not sweep it under the rug. Examine it very closely. 4. Do not make any sudden or abrupt business decisions. 5. Do not hesitate to stay away from an opportunity if your wise mind cautions you against it. 6. Know that everyone, even your trusted business partners with whom you may have had many positive, profitable experiences, are only human and capable of greed, just like you. 7. We are all human and capable of greed and delusion. The wise entrepreneur is aware of her/his own humanness and acts to reduce it! As always, going on beyond, I wish you well in your future business adventures! Pam :) Pam Britton is an entrepreneur, certified clinical hypnotherapist and NLP practitioner who combines her passion for service with an entrepreneurial mindset. Pam offers phone coaching for those who wish to be positioned on the forefront of the latest trends in positive psychology. Learn more at www.pambritton.com

Minding Your Business-How To Build Your Opt-In List

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By: Steve Renner

Before revealing the tricks of the trades, there are a few myths and fallacies that need to be cleared up. These common marketing misconceptions could be obstacle to you profiting from your online business. Business Mail - Get 1000 GB of Free Space w/ Yahoo Business Mail!  Email marketing is one of the most cost effective marketing methods today because virtually everyone uses email. When you are filling out various forms for processing different transactions online your email address is always required. A person without an email address is like a person without an online home, which is inexcusable for someone in this generation. Direct Email marketing (Spam) campaigns can offend a lot of people. The secret way around this problem is through permission-based marketing or Opt-In. The Real Deal with Building an Opt-In List Here's how you can benefit from the power of email marketing campaigns - building an Opt-In list. Building an good Opt-In list is not a cake walk for everyone, particularly for the uninformed. Here is a rundown of tips on how you can succeed with Opt-In Email Marketing. 1. Strategic Data Collection Capture the email address from your site visitors. This will help you to build your business and make sales skyrocket. There are several tactics you can use to make people voluntarily provide you with their personal information. This will make it easier to get higher conversions. Ask only for the Opt-In, with their first name and email addresses. 2. Good Implementation The old saying holds true - 'action speaks louder than words'. This easily translates to the difficulty people have when they go to executetheir email marketing efforts. There are various methods, often low-cost, around to help you build your Opt-In database. Tracking your email marketing results is important. You can use special software to handle this aspect of your marketing. This will help you to keep track of where your Opt-Ins are coming from. The following are the most widely used methods to leverage your Opt-In campaign without overspending: 1. Use a Squeeze Page. This is an excellent tool for data collection and can providing you with fresh leads. Offer a Bribe, or Free Offer in exchange for their email address. Use forms that collect your visitor's name and email address. 2. You can use of print ads, brochures, TV, radio and direct mail. These are the more traditional ways of marketing that still work to generate traffic to your site. You may want to ask for signups for email services. Make your website more visible through these media. Offering a free newsletters and or a free product or service can work to get the email from your visitors. 3. Maximize your sales force. An Affiliate Program can help you to benefit more from your email marketing campaign. Affiliates people with proper training on how to attract visitors can help you to get more Opt-In subscribers. 4. Don't make your point of sale confusing. Forms for signup located at the right spot on your Squeeze Page and other high-traffic pages can be very excellent ways for your business to collect email addresses. Notification of upcoming sales or some free bonus can be enough to coax them to supply you with the information you need. 5. Conferences or trade shows can work, too. Using Offline techniques can work well and should be used in addition to Online Methods. Giveaway offers or entries in a contest are a great incentive for people to volunteer their contact details. These tactics should be applied with caution and you should focus on earning the trust of your Opt-In list instead of simply collecting data for your own benefit. Always make sure that the forms and other methods that you use will not be too difficult to use for the subscriber. You don't want people to not be annoyed during the sign up process. Armed with this information, you can't go wrong building your opt-in list! Steve Renner, Author, Marketing Expert and Marketing Director for The Affiliate Community

Minding Your Business-Email Marketing in 2018 and Beyond

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By: Rimma Paulsen

Having preached about how email marketing is far from dead and taking a look at past mistakes in your campaign, it is time to take a long overdue look at the future. There have been massive strides made in the email marketing space in recent years but there is still plenty of room for improvement. As the lead support rep in North America, I am the first line of defence when a client comes in with a feature request, so I’ve heard it all. While there are some outlandish requests, like the ability to stop contacts from manually placing emails into the spam folder, there have been a number of ideas brought up that really struck a chord with me. Here, I will take the time to go over a few of these concepts and see how they could impact the email game going forward. Auto-segmentation and Personalization Business Mail - Get 1000 GB of Free Space w/ Yahoo Business Mail! You may be saying to yourself, "wait a second, both of these are doable right now! What’s up?" And that is true, but no to the extent email marketers want or need. Yes, you can parse lists according to a number of different variables and even customize email content based on pre-set values, but it still largely has to be done manually. What I’ve found to be a common request is the desire to do more in a fraction of the time. People want to import their list and then have the work done for them. While this may seem like the fantasy of a lazy salesperson, it actually isn’t that far from being a reality. With advances in AI happening so rapidly it isn’t out of the realm of possibility to create a thinking and growing email platform that can cut your workload in half. Imagine automatically seeing your contacts organised according to age group, gender or location and then a template is automatically brought up based on those segments? It would be quite the convenience wouldn’t it? The value of a flat out email list just isn’t there anymore; it is about all of the additional data you can collect about that list. Knowledge is power, and the more you know about a potential client the more versatility you grant yourself. With a system that could automatically sort through the information you input, create segments and populate templates with the best variables for that given segment a sales rep could get an exponential amount of work done in comparison to have to sift through everything manually. An Interactive Age – Branching Campaigns Much like the previous section, branching campaigns are not a novel concept, though they aren’t the norm either. But this idea expands on that even further. Take, for instance, a restaurant sending newsletters. Today you can have a static image of your menu, maybe an animated banner and links to your website. Wouldn’t it be better to have the entire interactive menu from the site proper embedded in the actual email chain? Instant gratification has become a staple of the Internet, so why not let your customers interact with your site from the get go? The email routine today goes a little like this: Email is received Open the email Client is interested Client clicks link and is taken to the website They then have to sign-in and search for whatever it was that interested them about the email. Along the way they lose interest because of the back and forth You can craft the perfect copy but the disconnect between the email and the actual purchasing process can lead to lost sales. If the interface of your email had the same level of interaction as your site you could essentially cut out the middleman and have them make purchases from directly within the message. Which then leads us to the concept of branching campaigns. Based on the level of interaction a client shows you can trigger different phases of the campaign. If someone is showing a lot of interest the platform would automatically detect this and skip ahead a few follow-ups to take a more direct approach. If a prospect seems a little more hesitant they would be sent down a path with a bit more nurturing. It all boils down to advancements in AI and the ability to implement these ideas into an email without setting off every spam filter on the Internet, but it would be nice! One-Click Purchases Building off of the interactive email concept, the ability to make a payment with a single click, through a fingerprint or retinal scan would be a huge boon to sales teams. This would mainly be for the mobile markets but the ability to make the sale with a single button press would benefit potential clients and companies alike. As mentioned above, there is a current disconnect between the email and the purchasing process. External links are necessary, which leads to unnecessary time being spent and potential frustration building. We live in a world of impulse buyers, and adding this tool may seem like taking advantage of the times, but isn’t that what we’re here for? If we aren’t going to capitalize on trends we may as well be in another industry all together. Giving people the option to buy your product or service with the touch of a button will save both party’s time and energy. As mentioned previously, all of these advancements rely on an expansion of the email platform in general as well as rapid AI development in the future. That being said, it isn’t too hard to imagine these actually coming to fruition in the near future. Nothing will ever beat a hand written letter to a potential client, but to be able to create that same feel in a fraction of the time is an immeasurable asset that shouldn’t be ignored.

Hope you enjoyed this article.If you want to put your email outreach on autopilot while keeping it personal then don't hesitate to contact Reply.io for more information. Here's the link - https://reply.io/

Minding Your Business-3 Fundamental Aspects of Internet Marketing that Should Never Be Ignored

Presented on US Sports Net By Yahoo Small Business!

Effectively promoting and marketing a product, service, website, or brand online can be quite the challenge in today’s competitive environment, requiring a multi-faceted approach and a significant investment of at least time and effort.For companies that are serious about getting their brand name out there on the World Wide Web, paying an experienced team of experts to do all the hard work seems to make the most sense from an investing standpoint. Still, even with an extensive advertising budget, simply deciding what to invest in first can seem like a daunting task when you’re just starting a campaign from scratch. Yahoo Small Business Web Hosting - Build a great web site with our easy-to-use tools  To provide a broad understanding of the main components of internet marketing, we’ve listed the following three promotion types that are essential in every marketing campaign. Search Engine Optimization Any website that aims to receive a large number of visitors on a daily basis should work to increase organic traffic through SEO. Organic traffic comes from visitors that stumble upon your site naturally while searching for a topic or keyword in a search engine like Google. By writing and posting content that targets popular searches or answers popular queries, you’ll be able to attract targeted traffic and, most importantly, if you can obtain #1 rankings, your site will be showing up at the top of Google whenever someone searches for a specific term or phrase, which is of course is a reputation booster. 2. Social Networking and Social Media Every internet marketing campaign should involve the creation and ongoing maintenance of multiple social networking accounts. Social media marketing can be defined as the practice of posting interesting and entertaining media to your social networking accounts so that it can be seen and shared by all of your followers, who then share it with their friends, creating the commonly mentioned "viral traffic" effect. You should devote a significant portion of your time to keeping social accounts updated and posting the best new content you can find or create. 3. PPC and Other Advertising Methods If you’ve ever browsed the internet for more than a minute, you’ve probably seen a text or banner ad before. They’re ubiquitous online, with advertising networks like Google Adwords making it easy for anyone to launch a campaign and have their ads posted on relevant sites in their niche the same day. For starters, you should be learning how to use Google’s pay-per-click (PPC) services to attract targeted visitors. A PPC advertising scheme only requires you to pay a set amount every time a web surfer clicks on one of your ads and is brought to the landing page on your site. Bringing it All Together After you attract a decent amount of traffic from the SEO and social media efforts, and have started getting conversions with the PPC, you can then calculate, on average, how much you’re having to spend on PPC before seeing a desired action (i.e. – a sales or newsletter sign-up) and from there you’ll be able to work out a rough estimate of how much it will cost you per conversion using PPC investments alone. 10 years of experience in seo field, i'm a Freelance SEO and a Freelance Wordpress

Yahoo Small Business-Professional Email Address Guidelines

Professional Email Address Guidelines

BY | SMALL BUSINESS

An electronic calling card of sorts, your email address makes a subtle, but lasting impression upon would-be clients and peers. If you’re doing business online and trading information via email, your choice of an address can help others perceive you as a responsible entity with whom they can reliably do business. No, SlickDaddy99@GenericHostingService.com simply isn’t going to cut it.

With that in mind, adhering to the following professional email address guidelines will get you a lot more traction in this regard.

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Using Your Own Domain Is Crucial

Employing a generic email domain suffix is one of the fastest ways to say, “I’m running a fly-by-night operation on the cheap.” While there was a time when a custom domain was a “nice-to-have,” it is now a “must.” Wholly indicative of your professionalism, experience and dedication, you simply have to have a branded mail address in today’s business environment.

Beyond that though, spam filters tend to weed out nonspecific domain names. This can prevent your messages from reaching those with whom you need to conduct business. What’s more, because your email address appears everywhere you send a message, it’s one of the least expensive ways to generate marketing impressions.

Nicknames Are Tacky—Avoid Them

If you had to guess, what would you say SlickDaddy99’s interests are? Either nobody knows, or nobody wants to know. And that’s bad for business.

Why leave your reputation open to interpretation? Always go with your name. This lets your colleagues know the message is from you right away.

Within that though, the exact format you choose will be predicated by a number of factors. If your organization is large, you’ll likely need to include full first and last names to differentiate between the five different Seans you employ or the three Janes you have on staff. This is also a good way to make a smaller organization look larger.

Use Special Addresses for Various Functions

Addresses such as CustomerService@MyCompany.com, Information@MyCompany.Com and Sales@MyCompany.com, can be used to route messages to specific areas of the business, while maintaining the anonymity of key people—until they want to disclose their direct addresses.

In addition to being a useful security measure, this gives you the capability of having a single message sent to several people at once in any given department. Sales messages can go to your sales managers, Customer Service messages can go to your customer service managers as well as you so you can keep an eye on things and so on.

Keeping these professional email address guidelines in mind when you’re establishing your communications protocols will improve the image of your business and help it run more efficiently. With domains more affordable than ever and scams proliferating at an ever-increasing rate, using your own domain name is no longer an option, it’s standard operating procedure.

If you don’t have a profession email set up, visit Yahoo Small Business to get yours today! You can now get a free professional email account, and free one page website, when you register a domain name. So there’s no longer any reason to use a generic address for your small business.